


What Lies Beyond

by nightsstarr



Category: Batman Beyond
Genre: collection, oneshots
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-15
Updated: 2014-01-23
Packaged: 2018-11-30 22:49:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11473272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightsstarr/pseuds/nightsstarr
Summary: Plot-separated oneshots set in the Batman Beyond universe. DC characters not mentioned in the cartoon or comic (mainly Mar'i Grayson) make appearances, as well, but the universe adheres to Batman Beyond canon.





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Historical AU

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Batman Beyond is tough to do a historical AU of, because it’s already cyberpunk which is a tricky genre, but I figured historical cyberpunk would be steampunk.

Terry McGinnis pulled the cloth mask over his face, the gears woven into the fabric of his suit weighing him down but providing the assistance he’d need for taking on someone like the lady Inque.

Her weakness was water, he knew that, and it was why he cornered her at the Gotham River. Unfortunately, since his suit was so heavy, he had a hard time swimming, himself. He wasn’t very eager to get too close to the banks of the river.

He pulled out a grappling hook gun, modeled after but much smaller than muskets and rifles. He pulled the trigger and braced his arm against the recoil. Steam escaped from the back as the grappling hook fixed itself to the spindly framework of the bridge where Inque had hidden herself.

He unfurled the bat wings with a flick of his arms and leaped. The framework of the bridge was slippery with algae and worn with rust, which give Inque the advantage here. All Terry needed to do was find her and knock her into the water below them before she found him.

The plan was easier in theory than in practice, however, as Terry’s vision was completely blacked out by an oncoming assault. Inky blackness crawled over the portion of cloth over his eyes, blinding him.

“Inque!” he growled, his voice muffled by the cloth, and he swiped at his eyes but to no avail. The only solution was to jump into the river while Inque was seeping into his costume.

It would be unpleasant, and he may need to abandon the costume, which was risky in itself, but it was the only thing he could do.

“Wait!” Inque cried, her voice coming from all around Terry. Already the blackness was beginning to fade as she began her retreat, but Terry flicked a switch in the palms of his suit, which triggered a small explosion in the soles of the boots.

The last time he tried that mechanism, he almost burned his legs off. The old man insisted that with enough tinkering, he’d be able to get Terry real flight, but they hadn’t tested the boots in weeks.

The explosion propelled him faster into the rough water of the Gotham River, causing Inque to shriek with the pain of dissolution.

She was the least of Terry’s problems. The gears in his uniform were weighing him down, drawing him deeper and deeper.

Even with his eyes closed, Terry could see the red of his own eyelids as bright light filtered through them. Strong fingers, warm even below water, clutched his shoulders and he was rapidly moving toward the surface.

As they broke into the air, narrowly avoiding the hull of the ship, Terry gasped in deep breaths of the polluted Gotham air.

“You okay, Batman?” Mar'i Grayson, his sometime-partner, asked as she began making her way to one of their bunkers.

After a few more moments of coughing, he answered. “Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks. I had it covered, though,” he added irritably. “You don’t need to save me when thongs get rough.”

“Uh huh,” Mar'i answered doubtfully as she continued toward the bunker where they would meet up with the old man.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Flirting or first date

Terry had pulled out all the stops, this time. She didn’t get why he thought that letting her find out about the Batman thing was the biggest screw up he’d ever made. He was acting like she’d found out some horrible secret about him, but really she kind of admired him for it. It must have been lonely, hiding it from so many people—except Max, but that wasn’t a thought she wasn’t willing to linger on for very long—for the past few years.

A stab of guilt pierced her as she thought of all the arguments they’d had, that she’d started, that were obviously because of the cowl, now that she thought about it.

Terry pulled out a chair for her and she took it, smiling at him.

It was important to remember that the arguments weren’t really her fault. If he’d just told her from the beginning, none of that would have happened.

She’d already punished him for that, having spent the past week making jabs about how he didn’t trust her. He told her that wasn’t true, that it was for her own safety, it wasn’t as though trust had nothing to do with it.

She let him talk her into a date—their first real date, where neither of them were hiding anything from the other—and it was the first time since she found out that she was able to put her anger at him aside, at least for the moment.

Terry was Batman, she thought as she watched him sit. He was the same as always—he kissed her the same way, he looked at her the same way, he put his hand on her back when they walked next to each other the same way—but at the same time, he was so different. Nothing really changed, but at the same time, everything changed at once. The muscles in his arms were suddenly much more apparent. His reflexes were sharper, the way he seemed distracted from their conversation when the first entered a new space so he could analyze the area with his eyes was obviously apparent, and his weird knowledge of the exact layout of Gotham was suddenly very fitting.

She was staring at him, she knew, but she couldn’t help it.

Terry was Batman. That meant that every time somebody had been saved by Batman it was Terry who saved them. Every date he slept through or rescheduled or plain missed seemed so insignificant.

“Dane,” he interrupted.

Blinking away the veil of her thoughts, she lifted her chin to show she was paying attention.

“You’re staring at me,” he told her. There was humor in his voice but it didn’t reach his expression.

“Sorry, but you could cut me some slack. It’s a rare treat to see you all dressed up, McGinnis,” she teased, although she got the feeling that he knew why she was really staring.

What she’d said was true enough; he abandoned his usual jacket for a well-fitted sports jacket, and the rest of his attire was suitable for the quality of the restaurant.

“Yeah. I told the old man that I couldn’t screw this one up. He gave me some clothes that used to belong to—” He paused. “Anyway, the jacket’s kind of old, but Bruce said sports jackets haven’t changed much in twenty years.”

Dana wrinkled her nose. She certainly was distracted if she hadn’t realized he was wearing a jacket that was too new to be vintage but too old to actually wear.

But she looked at Terry again, and he was smiling at her so freely. Of all the people he could be with, and of all the things he could do, he chose to spend his time with her at restaurants that he needed to borrow twenty year old jackets just to get into.

“It looks great, Terry,” she said softly.

He furrowed his eyebrows at her. Usually she’d scoff at how fashionably inept he is or at least roll her eyes.

She didn’t see how he could expect her to act like everything was the same as it always had been—and she realized with a cold stab that it was because for him, nothing had changed. To her, a whole world opened up but to Terry, hardly anything has changed.

Reaching across the small table, she slid her fingers against his.

He squeezed her fingers. “Are you sure you’re okay with my… uh… Promotion with Mr. Wayne? I couldn’t give it up, obviously, but I’d try to work something out with the old man that made you more comfortable.”

“Terry,” she said firmly. “It’s fine.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

They hadn’t gotten more than halfway through their meal—after the salad but before the entree—when Terry got a text message.

An important one, from the way he swore under his breath.

He raised his eyes to hers, squeezing his phone in an angry grip. “Dana,” he began, his tone apologetic and holding back anger, “I’m so sorry. I’m really sorry but I gotta go.”

Her spirits fell like they always did when Terry skipped out on her. She thought that since she knew why it would be differently, but no. It still hurt. At least he wasn’t giving her pathetic excuses.

“Go on,” she said, pulling on a smile.

He stood and pushed his chair in, but he stopped to look into her eyes. “You sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah. Go on, hero.”

The look he gave her was relieved. He was still doubtful that she was completely fine, but she didn’t mind that he allowed himself to be distracted from her.

“I’ll get dinner doggy-bagged. Stop by my house whenever you’re done, we’ll microwave our food then.”

“Your house? I tend not to get done with this kind of stuff until late.”

She smirked at him and lowered her eyelashes. “You afraid of an unlocked window, McGinnis?”

He raised his eyebrows at her before returning her smile. “No, ma’am,” he answered, shaking his head.

He took the time to kiss her on the cheek and put down a wad of bills before rushing out.

Dating Batman wouldn’t be glamorous, she realized as she rested her chin in her hand, sitting alone at a five-star restaurant. It wouldn’t be all arm muscles and sexy scars and heroic acts of justice that filled her with pride. It would be worrying, skipped dates, and unexplainable solo arrivals to parties and events.

She wondered if she could handle it.

Terry was true to his word. He did get done ‘kinda late’. Dana nearly rolled off her bed in fright when there was a loud tap at her window, which she opened after popping off the screen.

She let Terry in and sat him on her bed, flipping back the cowl and stroking a green spot on his cheek that would bloom into a bruise before the night ended.

At his insistence that he was starving, she snuck to the kitchen and warmed their food, bringing the styrofoam containers to her room to act as plates.

As she sat cross-legged on her bed in a nightgown and pair of sweatpants she added before letting him in, she thought that the moments like these made dating Batman worth all the trouble.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Batman Beyond AU prompt where Terry and Dana are partners as Batman + Batgirl Beyond.

Terry froze as the sight of Batgirl’s head being yanked back by her hair filled his vision. He wouldn’t be able to get to her in time.

When Dana found out that he was Batman, she took better than he’d expected she would, but mainly because he expected het to smack him and break up with him on the spot. Instead, he’d had to watch as tears filled her eyes and let himself out of her house because she ran to the bathroom connected to her room and wouldn’t come out.

She wouldn’t talk to him for a week. He sent her scores of texts every night, first begging her to talk to him and reminding her that he loved her, then petering down to “thinking of you” texts in the middle of the day and updates about his wellbeing while he was on patrol, because how that she knew he was out she’d probably want to know.

When she was ready to talk to him again, it was with a proclamation Terry didn’t expect.

“I want in.”

They argued. He hadn’t let Max in, who’d known for years–there was no way Dana was getting herself mixed up with the cape and cowl. He punched her lamp off the desk and swore at her. Of course, Dana Tan wasn’t about to let anybody besides her father tell her what to do, and she swore right back, screaming at him. It was lucky her father wasn’t home.

He warned her not to talk to him again until she cleared ger head, but the next night she followed him. It wasn’t that hard, really. She knew where the old man lived. Terry wasn’t watching his back, since he was still too angry at Dana to be thinking clearly.

Bruce spotted her the second she crept into the Cave, accusing Terry of bringing her and starting a three-way shouting match. Dana finally revealed her plan–include her or she’d go public. It was a real threat, too, because Dana’s father could call a press conference pretty easily.

Bruce threatened to drug her, but Terry put his foot down. He was angry about it, but he wasn’t going to drug his tenuous-girlfriend.

The old man and Terry told her everything. They told her about Bruce’s parents, about Tim Drake, about Arkham, about how Bruce had been completely alone since Terry showed up because the stress of the cowl was too much for them.

It didn’t change her mind.

Dana wasn’t completely useless. She’d taken some self-defense classes after getting kidnapped by that rat guy, and she stuck with it after taking the minimum amount of classes to please her father.

She wasn’t strong, though, and she was plain unskilled. It took months for Bruce to moodily allow her out of the cave in the modified blue Batgirl suit. Her skills were shaky, but she should be able to take on any knife-wielding thug easily.

Besides that, it was a Monday night, notoriously slow in the underworld. They were hoping that Dana would get a taste of what it was really like and back off.

There was a screw up–some college kids finishing a job that was probably supposed to be done over the weekend–and Dana was being held by a guy twice her size, her hair pulled so roughly her back was arching, while another stood an arm’s length away, a knife held out and pointed at her chest.

Terry was frozen in the shadows, watching just out of reach. He could jump down there, but any wrong move would get a knife lodged in Dana’s chest.

“McGinnis!” Bruce’s voice hissed in his ear. “Move!”

But he couldn’t, he couldn’t even breathe. And even if could, what would he do? Throwing himself between her body and the knife seemed to be the only thing that would help her, and then he’d be too injured to fight.

An explosion of blue flame from under Dana’s feet knocked her back, the guy pulling her hair trapped behind her, and they slammed into a brick wall behind her.

“Batman, the other one’s yours!” she called, her voice breathless and filled with excitement.

Terry snapped into action and he jumped at the leader while Dana started on the three or four guys left in the small group.

When they’d handled the thugs, snapping handcuffs on their limp wrists, Terry grabbed Dana’s wrist and backed her against the wall.

“What do you think you’re doing, rushing in there like that? You could’ve gotten hurt.”

She shook his wrist off. “It turned out fine.”

“It almost didn’t, Dana, Jesus!”

“I went through the crazy old man’s nark boot camp,” she reminded him, her tone severe.

“I can hear you,” Bruce muttered into both of their earpieces.

Terry switched the comm in his suit off, then reached for Dana’s right ear to pluck her earpiece out.

Gently, but with scorching fervor, he lifted up the bottom of her mask at her chin to kiss her.

They’d made up before then, but this was the first real kiss they’d exchanged since before Dana found out that Terry was Batman months ago. He braced himself by his palms, then leaned closer and braced himself by his forearm, their bodies touching and Dana’s hair getting stuck in the imperfections of the brick wall behind her.

“I’m worried about you, Dane,” he murmured, nuzzling her mouth with his as he spoke. “I’m so damn worried about you.”

The passion that was exploding out of him minutes ago turned to cold, shaky dread at the pictures in his mind.

“Hey,” she soothed, lifting her mask away from her face completely. “Hey, it’s all schway,” she murmured, cupping his face and kissing his cheek. “I know how you feel, Terry. That’s how I felt when I found out what you were really doing.”

She pressed a few more soothing kisses against his face before taking in a deep breath. “That’s why I wanted to do this. I knew I couldn’t ask you to stop, but if I can be with you at least I don’t hate to worry as much.”

Her words sent an icicle of self-loathing through his stomach. His fault. His fault she’d almost gotten knifed–

“And don’t look like that,” she scolded, deciphering the expression on his face. “It’s not the only reason. I also look great in this jumpsuit.”

He laughed, dry, barking laughter, but genuine nonetheless. “Yeah,” he agreed, kissing her cheek before sliding her mask into place, concealing her face. “You do.”


End file.
